Chasing
the Rodeo:On
Wild Rides and Big Dreams, Broken Hearts and Broken Bones,
and One Man’s Search for the West

By
W.K. Stratton Harcourt, 320 pages, $25

American sports culture is as diverse as it is divergent.
NBA hopefuls, competitive cheerleaders, and freestyle BMXicans
struggle, fail and prosper in states of mutual obliviousness.
A legend in one milieu can easily die unknown to the readers
of People. Indeed, the world of sport has never been
wider.

Even
still, it’s odd that a seemingly home-brewed concoction like
rodeo should become marginal. But facts must be faced: Name
a rodeo star with even half the recognition of a Paris Hilton
hanger-on? Exactly. Couple this with the growing suburbanization
of the populace and the rodeo is now as exotic as ice curling
to the average Haitian.

W.K. Stratton’s Chasing the Rodeo makes the sport seem
familiar even if the book defies easy categorization. As a
native Oklahoman, Stratton’s love for bronc and bull riding
is practically a birthright, as his biological father was
a rodeo bum (with the emphasis on bum), and his mother a certified
cowgirl. His book is part rodeo memoir, part series of profiles
on rodeo greats, and part survey of the sport’s culture and
folklore.

One of Chasing’s great strengths comes in its unearthing
of historical nuggets. Who knew, for example, that an African-American
cowboy named Bill Pickett single-handedly invented bulldogging,
or steer wrestling, and went on to become one of the sport’s
first superstars. After gaining props from the likes of President
Teddy Roosevelt, Pickett went on to star in silent films composed
of all African-American casts that attempted not to engage
in crude stereotypes. However, his star bona fides didn’t
protect him from Jim Crow, which consigned him to sleep with
the livestock while traveling by train. By way of compliments,
his fellow cowboys bestowed such gems as, “Bill’s hide was
black, but his heart was white.”

Gulp.

Ultimately, what Stratton seems to be chasing is an authentic
American ritual that takes the stuff of hard work and transforms
it into a celebration of hard play. As such, he attempts to
settle the thorny debate on where the rodeo originated. While
often described as “the only spectator sport originating entirely
in the United States,” with towns like Prescott, Ariz., and
Pecos, Texas, sniping for the designation as its birthplace,
Stratton claims that like so many “American” goods, rodeo
was made in Mexico. In fact, he contends that it predates
the cowboy era by several centuries, as it was the rancheros
of colonial New Spain who hosted charreadas celebrations
during the annual roundup, where competitive horseplay gave
birth to today’s rodeo events.

In an age of mass consumption, the question of authenticity
is often conflated with fashion. Historical accuracy takes
a backseat to the kind of branding not familiar to most cowhands.
Stratton chronicles the various jean companies who struggled
to make themselves “the” premiere rodeo denim. For years,
he was convinced Levis were the end all and be all of cowboy
wear, only to find that in the 21st century it was Wrangler
who cornered the market. All this is to say nothing of the
fact that real cowboys wore chaps, not jeans.

Stratton frets over the rush to position rodeo as the next
NASCAR, a breakout sport that’s both a brand and a demographic
unto itself (for more on this see “Rove, Karl” and “Dads,
NASCAR”). The fear is that excessive branding will strip the
sport of its soul. Stratton clearly prefers Oregon’s Pendleton
Roundup, where jumbotrons and corporate logos are verboten.

For all Stratton’s reporting, it’s his personal reflections
that make the book most compelling. For, as he’s chasing the
rodeo zeitgeist, he is also chasing the ghost of his biological
father, “Cowboy Don.” While this quest is less than glorious,
rodeo is one of the few traces Stratton has to his dad, who
left his mom when he was an infant. A prodigious drinker and
ladies man, this Denver native son was never much of a star
and eventually wound up punching a clock as a construction
worker. After a string of failed marriages and relationships,
he died broke and largely alone.

While Stratton doesn’t advance such an argument, it’s hard
to deny the connection between “chasing the rodeo” and a larger
voyage for paternal communion. Whether its baseball or bulldogging,
sports are one of very few avenues by which a sense of manhood
is conveyed. Perhaps this explains why sports highlight films
on ESPN (the male Lifetime) are as schmaltzy as anything
Nora Ephron might produce.

Chasing
the Rodeo may not satisfy hardcore fans, though they will
no doubt benefit from its historical detail. And while there’s
an excessive amount of banal narrative involving Stratton’s
rental cars, motel, and press-box experiences, there’s enough
to this journey to make it worth the trouble of saddling up
and following along.